Lonely
by Candylovin Fehrian
Summary: Updated and improved, I think... Okay, I was in a sad mood, which means, a sad story. Gage feels lonely, why? What happened? Ofcourse still SG!
1. His girls

_**A/N Well, I just couldn't help it... I had to write one story with a sad ( well, you could also see it as a happy...) ending. It's pretty dark, but full of emotion. Please read and tell me what you think! Song by Dido: "Honestly ok"**_

_ I just want to feel safe in my own skin,  
I just want to be happy again  
I just want to feel deep in my own world  
But I'm so lonely  
I don't even want to be with myself anymore _

He never thought he could feel this way. The emotions weren't even there anymore. And he was left, feeling empty. Francis Gage was gone. The only thing left was his body, and although it was functioning like it was supposed to, his eyes were dead as if his soul had already left this world.

His eyes found the beautiful sunset, knowing they wouldn't see it anymore. Knowing she wouldn't see it anymore. The picture, clutched in his hands, was torn and crumpled. But he didn't care. It was the only thing he had left of them. Turning his bright blue eyes towards the sky, he tried to keep the tears at bay. Swallowing hard, he held the picture to his stubbled cheek.

And suddenly, he felt the surge of emotion swirling through him. The loneliness was overwhelming and he doubled over, gasping for breath as the sobs took over his tired body.

"Why did you do it Syd? Why did you leave me? And you took them with you, why Syd, why?" The words escaped his throat in one long breath.

Sagging to his knees, he took one last look at the picture. They looked happy, he had his arms draped around Syd, and together they looked lovingly at the two 5-year olds who were sitting in front of them, smiling toothless smiles at the camera.

With on last kiss on each of the beautiful smiles he put the picture in his back pocket, together with the letter he had put in there. He let his thoughts drift off one last time, to the events that had led him to this place…

_On a different day,  
if I was safe in my own skin,  
then I wouldn't feel lost and  
so frightened _

It had been a long day, and Gage was glad he was almost home. The bouquet of flowers was loosely held in one hand as he got out of his car and juggled with the keys. It was their anniversary. Seven years… He couldn't believe they had been married for that long. He remembered that, after Angela had been born, they had gotten closer. And after one more 'happy-kiss' and a dangerous assignment they had confessed their love to each other. Gage chuckled, well it hadn't been that easy, but a year later they were planning the wedding.

Two years into the marriage, Syd had started feeling sick. They had been worried, but a visit from Alex and a doctors visit had cleared things up. They were going to be parents! 9 Months later the twins were born and they couldn't be happier. Gage loved being a parent, even though he had been scared in the very beginning. He didn't want to become his foster parent. But everything turned out great, him and Syd were a great team, and together they had raised two beautiful 5-year old girls.

Shaking his head he turned his attention towards the house. It was unusually quiet, considering the twins were home with Syd who had taken a day off. And usually the three of them made a big thing out of one of those days.

Seeing Syds car standing in the driveway he started to get that nagging feeling again. He had been having it all day, but after calling the house and talking to Evan, who was talking a mile a minute, he felt a little bit better.

When he came closer to the door, he suddenly tensed. It was open… Sydney never let the door open, she was deathly afraid one of the girls would run out on the street before getting hit by a car. With the flowers still in his hand he slowly opened the door.

"Syd! You in here?" he yelled, not getting an answer.

"Squirts, you playing hide and seek again? Well too bad, I had pizza for my girls, but I guess I'll have to eat it all alone…"

When he didn't get any respond to that, he started getting really worried. They were crazy about pizza… Slowly he made his way through the house, but he found nothing.

All of a sudden something at the end of the stairs caught his eye. It was glistening in the late afternoon sun. Stepping a little closer he couldn't help but gasp, it was a small drop of blood. His mind started getting into overload, maybe one of the girls fell, what if something happened to Syd and the girls ran off, frightened to death.

With the flowers still in one hand, but a gun in the other by now, he slowly went up the creaky stairs. When he reached the last step a weird smell hit his nose. One he knew very well, and also one he never hoped to smell in this house. It was the smell of blood, and it clung to the entire hallway. Turning towards the master bedroom Gage sent a small prayer to the heavens above, praying his girls were alright.

When he reached the bedroom and saw the remains of it, he felt his knees go weak. Something had happened in here. Clothes were thrown across the room, chairs were overturned. Overall it looked like there had been a fight in there. But still, there was no one to be seen.

With fear in his heart he turned to the last place he hadn't looked, the twins bedroom. Like a flash he saw himself and Syd standing over their little pink cribs, silently watching the beautiful new-borns, both letting tears of joy flow down their faces.

But now the door was closed, and he saw something he had not seen before. It was a note, and it was taped to the closed door. With shaking hands he touched the words written in red.

"Now _you_ are alone…"

The words rang through his head while he pulled his hand back as if he was burned by those words. A red stain coloured his fingers. The flowers were already lying on the floor, scattered in the hallway as he made himself touch the doorknob. The red paint stained it, but he wasn't aware. The only thing he was aware of was his heartbeat. It sounded like a drum going through his chest after pounding it in his throat and ears.

He turned the knob, fearing what he would find. But nothing could have prepared him for what he found in the little pink bedroom, now coloured red…


	2. Aftermath

The ongoing screams of a man in constant agony had alerted one of the neighbours and after a while the police arrived. They were held back by a middle-aged looking man with a beard and a cowboy hat. He wanted to go in first, telling the others he knew the man living there, as he was a fellow ranger.

But what Walker saw after entering the bedroom of Evan and Lily Gage, left him with nightmares for weeks. His young friend, his fellow ranger, the loving father and husband was sitting in the middle of the room, rocking back and forth with his arms around two small broken forms. They were all covered in blood, and at first sight you couldn't tell where one ended and the other began.

After fighting the nausea and wiping his blurry eyes he recognized another form, lying against the two children, it lay still and by the looks of it she had tried to protect them until the end.

Walker was afraid to move, he had never felt more frozen in his entire life. But when the grieving man stopped rocking after a full hour and started to grab his gun, Walker knew he had to do something. Yet he still waited. He saw him look at his gun, as if he had never seen it before. He saw him looking at the still bodies on his lap. And he saw him bring the gun up, to his own head.

That was when Walker finally seemed to get the feeling back in his limbs. His voice seemed to work too, cause he heard himself say, "Gage, no!", as he flew towards him and softly pulled the gun into his own hands.

Gage kept looking straight forward, but when Walker took the gun away, his only means of escape, he turned haunted eyes towards him, and with a soft whisper he pleaded, "Please, let me be with them, please…"

Walker had never seen someone with eyes like that. When they made contact, he felt like he was hit with small piercing daggers, digging themselves deep into his heart. The young ranger had no life left in them, only death. But even though he had the same urge as his friend, he had to keep him from hurting himself.

"Gage… Who did this?"

And with those words, Gage had found a reason to stay. If only for a little while…

_ But this is today and I'm lost in my own skin  
And I'm so lonely  
I don't even want to be with myself anymore  
I just want to feel safe in my own skin,  
I just want to be happy again._

And he had succeeded. It took him two weeks to find the bastard who murdered his family, but he had found him. Fingerprints had been found all over the room, most of them were from Syd or one of the girls. But after some research Trivette found out who the other ones belonged to.

All that time, Gage was living his life like a zombie. He stayed with Walker, because they didn't trust him to be on his own. For after the gun incident they had found him several times, trying to end his own life.

There was the time at the morgue, where he went to say goodbye one last time. But when he didn't come out of the cold room for over two hours, Alex had walked in, finding him sitting on the floor between Syd and the twins. A surgical knife had been placed on his wrist, and a thin line of blood was already appearing. Alex had let out a stifled scream, before rushing over and yanking the knife out of his hands.

After that episode, they had taken him to the hospital, where they had stitched up his wrist and he was given some medication to help him sleep. But when the funeral was over, and they still had no clues to who the murderer was, Gage seemed to close off even more.

The day of the funeral was grey while the rain softly landed on the damp grass. People were huddled under black umbrellas, while Gage, together with Sydney's parents and the other rangers, was standing in front of the three graves. Two tiny caskets were being lowered after Gage had put a white rose on each of them. And after Gage had touched Sydney's casket one last time, it was lowered into the large hole in the ground. When it was down, all the guests let their white flower flow after it. So the top of the casket was filled with white, before being covered with dirt.

The crowd had emerged, leaving a heartbroken ranger standing in the rain, alone… That was, until a small hand took hold of his larger one. He had looked down at the blonde curly head of 7-year old Angela. She had looked up to him, and as an unspoken agreement, they turned, to follow the other friends and rangers.

That night, he had tried again, this time he almost succeeded, if it hadn't been for Walker who had entered just in time to see the pills being swallowed away with a bottle of liquor.

But everything changed when Trivette discovered who the fingerprints belonged to. Gage had a destiny now: find the one who killed his loved ones, and kill him. And when they raided the house of the criminal Gage had put away a long time ago, they had caught him. Pictures where everywhere. Snapshots of Gage and Sydney on the job. Shots of the twins, at school and at home. They were everywhere, some of them were torn, others had the faces cut out.

And when the grudge filled murderer tried to escape, using one of Trivette's guns, Gage didn't doubt for a second. He shot every bullet his gun contained, he even kept shooting after the man was already on the ground, dead.

Turning around, Gage had left the house.

It was finally over…

_ And I'm so lonely  
I don't even want to be with myself anymore  
I just want to feel safe in my own skin,  
I just want to be happy again. _


	3. I will love you

_**A/N I wasn't very happy with the ending of the story. But after listening to Fishers "I will love you", I knew what was missing. So here is the improved ending, still sad, but better (I think...) **_

So here he was, sitting on the cliff, watching the last sunset. This would be _his _last sunset. If he looked hard enough, he could see their faces, smiling at him, beckoning him to join them. Touching his back pocket one last time, to make sure the picture and the letter were still there, he slowly wrapped his hand around the service gun he had taken from Walkers ranch.

This afternoon he had visited their graves one last time. The fresh bouquet of flowers was lying on his wife's stone. For the twins he had brought their favourite teddy bears. He had sat by their graves, talking to them as if they were still there. He told his wife about catching the killer, and for his two girls, he sang their favorite lullaby. When he finished singing, he almost expected to hear Syds playful banter, telling him he shouldn't scare the kids with his voice. But when no sound was heard, he knew it was time.He had left the graves with one last look, knowing he would see them all soon.

He had found his way to this place easily. It was where him and Syd went for their honeymoon... They had decided to stay close to home, knowing full well they would be in the cabin anyway. God, he missed her. Just the thought of her touch made him shiver. And whenever that shiver came, the grief would hit him as well. Knowing he would never see her again was agonizing. And the twins... They had always been the sunshine in his life. Whenever he or Syd had felt bad, they had been there, with chubby hands and toothless smiles, to comfort them with a touch, so simple but so pure.

A slight breeze touched his upturned face, and for one second it was like having them back again. But when he opened his eyes, he was still alone. A determined look filled his hollow face when the thought filled his mind: 'But not for long.'

With trance like moves, he brought the gun to his temple. The sun was now below the horizon, darkness started consuming the area.

After one last sigh, and the sound of her name on his lips, a loud noise resounded through the silent forest, causing birds to fly from their resting place within the trees. A few seconds later, everything was quiet again. Silence had returned to the beautiful cliff with the outstretched area of nature. Not a sound could be heard, but within the gust of wind, which moved over the area, the light sound of childrens laughter could be heard...

And Francis Gage was at peace.

_Til my body is dust  
til my soul is no more  
I will love you - love you_

Til the sun starts to cry  
and the moon turns to rust  
I will love you - love you

But I need to know  
will you stay for all time  
forever and a day

Then Ill give my heart  
til the end of all time  
forever and a day

But I need to know  
will you stay for all time  
forever and a day

Then Ill give my heart  
til the end of all time  
forever and a day

when the storms fill my eyes  
and we touch the last time  
I will love you - love you... 


End file.
